2015 — 28 May: Thursday
Given our splendid new guvmint's intention to publish 'details' of its nefarious plans for a simple-minded "in? out?" referendum1 on EU membership today, I feel an elided quote from yesterday's bio of Keynes is appropriate.
The urge to self-deception... was what he most resisted. Public opinion he recognised as gullible, uninformed, wayward and super-abundant in misplaced confidence... it was impossible to convey the complexities... when voters only understood warcries or catchphrases.
I expect our media will weigh in on the side of rationality to help us all decide to vote the way they "want". Meanwhile, I've just read Duncan Kelly's "take" on the bio in the TLS. I suspect I won't be opting for the three-volume variant by Robert Skidelsky, let alone the arm's length worth of original works (thirty, I gather) by the man himself. Life's a bit too short.
I didn't hear...
... the Queen's speech, though I deduced what was probably going on from all the colourful pageantry glowing from the massed ranks of flat screen TVs I was wandering past in John Lewis yesterday at the time. Apparently "It read like the ramblings of a man the morning after a dreadful one-night stand with the electorate, wondering what on earth he promised during the passion". (Source.)
Never personally having had the 'pleasure' of such an assignation, I wouldn't have a clue on the conventional etiquette governing such a post-coital conversation.2 Particularly among politicians.
Call me cynical...
... but I mildly observe that the two cheques I paid in on 22nd May as part of the process of "gathering in" dear Mama's estate — although displaying on my account balance by the time I had driven home — languish as "unavailable" still, while the debit card refund for the faulty 5TB hard drive I returned to the store on Tuesday successfully made its way into the same fine financial institution within 24 hours. I wonder exactly who is making precisely how much hay (as it were) with my funds while they crawl through the mechanism.
What a pity
It's been 48 years since I was struck by a casual reference in Robert Heinlein's idea-packed "Beyond this horizon" (1942) to a chap with parallel mental processes. (Chapter 11: "The Member from the Antilles looked up from the book he was reading [not rudeness; everyone present knew that he had parallel mental processes and no one expected him to waste half the use of his time out of politeness...".]) Heinlein's story was set three centuries ahead.
When the corpus callosum is severed, the (cerebral) hemispheres can communicate via the brainstem. It's a longer route, though, and a much thinner pipe: think dial-up versus broadband... hemispheric isolation can also be induced chemically, by anaesthetising half the brain — and the undrugged hemisphere, unshackled from its counterpart, sometimes manifests a whole new suite of personality traits right on the spot.
So while the thing that calls itself I typically runs on a dual-core engine, it's perfectly capable of running on a single core.
Slightly creepy stuff. [Pause] Closer to home, I've just agreed the date for my new garage door to be fitted. That's got to be worth another cuppa. And hearing Rob Cowan describe the "splendid rendition" of Chopin's Preludes, op. 28 by Grigory Sokolov I'm now left wondering how "rendition" can also mean transporting chaps to countries that have a more robust attitude to the use of what our cousins across the Pond call "enhanced interrogation techniques". It's an unfunny wor(l)d.
Not including...
... the gentle zephyrs currently wafting in through the wide open patio door to help dissipate recent evidence of lunchtime cooking, today's bursts of fresh air have included:
- a quick trot to a post box to send off my signed Letter of Indemnity so that BP can re-issue 35 mislaid share certificates. I declined the "Pay us £58 and get them faster" option as £58 is a generous fraction of their 'value'.
- a quick trot to Shed #2 to retrieve from it the slightly rustier, slightly older, hammer I reasoned Christa kept there when I failed to turn up the slightly less rusty, slightly newer, hammer I have put somewhere other than its normal "place".
- a gentle clamber up a stool to enable me to reach, and hammer a few tacks into, the waterproof felt that had partially peeled back from the roof of Shed #1. I noticed this while idly inspecting the side of my house from neighbour Christine's porch while waiting for her to put the rabid dog out of the way before discussing the matter of the mislaid Amazon parcel the other day.
The newer hammer was in the last place I looked — Peter's room — and is now back in its normal "place". He or his g/f used it last, I now recall, when assembling their new bed a month or so ago. But (clearly) I can go a month or more without popping into 'his' room.
The Will Gregory...
... I've just heard on "In Tune" is the chap from Goldfrapp. When I caught some of his Moog music I was almost sure it was Wendy Carlos. Now, the question is should I try Messiaen's Turangalîla Symphony (again) this evening? It's fairly hard work. [Pause] Guess who'd managed to overlook albums #4 through #6 from Goldfrapp? Tut, tut.